Is another Hitler in post-WWII Germany possible

Is another Hitler in post-WWWII Germany/West Germany plausible

  • Yes

    Votes: 15 17.4%
  • No

    Votes: 71 82.6%

  • Total voters
    86
Let's get this out of the way. I am not asking if it was possible for the Nazis to rise again in post-war Germany. The Allies were very thorough in their denazification process, making sure to tear out the roots of anything related to the Nazis. (Of course, the US gave prominent Nazis of strategic value false identities under Operation Paperclip, but that's another matter). The fact that there was no major upriisng against Allied rule, aside from a few attacks from the Werewolves, puts that question to bed.

What I mean is, is it plausible for another charismatic firebrand agitator in the same vein as Hitler (Raging about Germany's defeat in the war, promising a new, stornger Germany, raging against the Allied occupation and later partition of Germany, etc) to rise during the Cold War in West Germany (I'm pretty sure the Soviets would stamp out any such figure in East Germany) and if it is, is it plausuble for said firebrand to achieve some kind of political power in West Germany?
 
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What I mean is, is it plausible for another charismatic firebrand agitator in the same vein as Hitler (Raging about Germany's defeat in the war, promising a new, stornger Germany, raging against the Allied occupation and later partition of Germany, etc) to rise during the Cold War in West Germany (I'm pretty sure the Soviets would stamp out any such figure in East Germany) and if it is, is it plausuble for said firebrand to achieve some kind of political power in West Germany?

He'd get some support but nowhere near what Adolf got. After having just endured two disastrous wars the German people had little stomach for more. They wouldn't like the feeling of deja vu.
 
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No on the basis that the US/other Europeans occupying Western Germany wouldn't just sit by and let said Hitler 2.0 gain any prominence, just the same as the Soviets would stomp out any such figure in the East.
 
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I'd say very little chance.

“The rare case where the conquered is very satisfied with the conqueror.”
— Konrad Adenauer
 
No on the basis that the US/other Europeans occupying Western Germany wouldn't just sit by and let said Hitler 2.0 gain any prominence, just the same as the Soviets would stomp out any such figure in the East.

The difference is that by 1960 or earlier, West Germany had real independence. It could've evicted allied troops if it wished. It just needed them to resist Soviet domination. In theory, with Adolf 2, a more militarized West Germany could look after itself. There was just insufficient potential backing or stomach for that. But if it happened, I'm not sure the western democracies would've resorted to military force. Sure, based on recent history, lots of people in the West would've had no problem with forcefully nipping a new Adolf in the bud. But besides the West German armed forces a potential problem was that Adolf 2, if unsure of his ability to hold out, might throw in his lot with the Soviets or threaten to do so.
 
This statement is debatable.

They were perfectly wiling to use ex-Nazis as long as they did not now engage in neo-Nazi politics. (Just as the GDR was willing to use ex-Nazis who were loyal to the SED regime--although they certainly didn't get as high positions as ex-Nazis got in the FRG.)
 
Something like this (kind of) happens in For All Time it however requires a number of circumstances to make it happen:
1. A US that retreats back into isolationism post-war.
2. A Soviet union that is inward-looking and focused on building up its economy and not in exporting revolution abroard. Alternatively, it could choose to foster division in Europe and adopt a "divide to rule approach".
3. Another dolchstosslegende of sorts in Germany.
4. A disunited Europe that can't stand-up to a German revival.
 
He'd get some support but nowhere near what Adolf got. After having just endured two disastrous wars the German people had little stomach for more. They woudn't like the feeling of deja vu.
Simply put not in Germany. More likely in Poland, Hungary or Italy (more Mussolini than Hitler).
 
I say give it one more generation where the children of the war generation are all but dead and it becomes just as possible (maybe a bit more) as in any other nation, though not super likely in any event.

As the last people who remember the war die, the more abstract political atrocities become, especially if all media is viewed as generally suspect rather than trusted with caveats.
 
No, Germany is not in a position militarily or geographically to do so at any point after the war. In the west its military culture is eradicated and its influence is thoroughly castrated and widely mistrusted by the public and the west is very keen on it staying that way, the impeding threat from the east leaves germany firmly dependent on NATO which the west is more than glad to take advantage of. in short another hitler in germany as it was after the war is not possible as germany as an independent entity is seen as unacceptable by the rest of its neighbours.
 
The difference is that by 1960 or earlier, West Germany had real independence. It could've evicted allied troops if it wished.

Not true. Even after the Western Allies recognized the FRG as sovereign, they retained residual occupation rights:

"...[T]he 1952/54 Convention on Germany,15 which in article 1(2) granted the FRG sovereignty, did to a certain extent modify the situation. For example, from that time onward the three Western allies were represented in the FRG by Ambassadors instead of High Commissioners.

"However, some residual occupationary rights, namely the right to station troops in West German territory, were reserved in article 4 together with article 2, and were in fact still utilized until unification. This situation did not change substantially with the Emergency Law, which came into force on June 25, 1968, and referred to article 5(2) of the Convention on Germany. In fact, the Western allies continued to reserve their rights as to Germany as a whole, for example, in the Quadripartite Agreement on Berlin of 1971; and their acquiescence to the Emergency Law was necessary, since they could not be bound by federal laws of West Germany. The consent to the Emergency Law expressed in the Note of the three Western allies of December 13, 1967, was given only with regard to "the protection of the security of armed forces stationed in the Federal Republic," not with regard to "the stationing of armed forces," the right to which remained reserved under article 4(1). Thus, no acquiescence in the FRG's efforts toward unity existed to estop the Western allies from demanding certain conditions regarding the stationing of troops, conditions making the FRG slightly less than fully sovereign." https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1006&context=spacelaw

"Indeed, some residual occupation rights were in effect until October 2, 1990, when the Four Powers finally suspended those rights in connection with German unification." https://books.google.com/books?id=c3IPexUZ4EkC&pg=RA1-PA13
 
Some are unaware Hitler came to power as an anti-war candidate. He campaigned in 1932 no one hated war more then him having seen it and he would roll back the ToV without war.

Hitler was a demagogue who could be all things to all people when needed politically.
 

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While the Soviet have the East, the U.S. has bases across the West and the BAOR is in country?

NOT happening.
 
Some are unaware Hitler came to power as an anti-war candidate. He campaigned in 1932 no one hated war more then him having seen it and he would roll back the ToV without war.

Hitler was a demagogue who could be all things to all people when needed politically.

He never was the "Anti-War-Candidate". That would imply that there was a major pro-war-party at this time, which wasn't.

To answer OP's question:

Only if something as devastating as the Morgenthau Plan had been implemented. Yes, most Germans wheren't antifascists after the war and some even attacked resistance figures as being traitors, but most actually liked the FRG and even nationalists often didn't attack the US but the USSR as the main defender of German partition.
 
This statement is debatable.

Actually, as David T pointed out, there's a very big difference between ex-Nazis and Neo-Nazis. There was no problem with ex-Nazis, who had abandoned the ideology, but Neo-Nazis would never be tolerated, for obvious reasons.
 
This statement is debatable.

In addition to what I previously said, the Western Allies may have had severe difficulties creating a West Germany without ex-Nazi officials, because in Nazi Germany all officials had to be affiliated with the Nazi Party, and getting rid of them all would probably be impossible.
 
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